Basic tailoring - oh my!

Last night was knit club night.  Good progress was made with Project Turban (more on this later!), the wine and chocolate flowed, and we compared disastrous brother stories. But the icing on the cake for me was being given a book that our hostess's mother in law had been clearing out.  

Basic Tailoring from Time Life Books (1975) looks pretty unassuming from the outside, but check out the title page for Chapter 1 and you'll understand why my heart skipped a little stacked heel beat. What could be more jolly than a kalaidescope montage of a 70s suited couple!

 I  have fallen in love with this book! Yes, the content is good - great step by step guide to tailoring with a bit of suiting history thrown in for good measure, but for me, the content comes second to the amazing images from a time before Photoshop...

  ...when men were maxing out the bow-ties and feeling mightily flambouyant with their evening wear...

"Hey man, I am loving that bowtie." "Why thanks, I made it myself."

Wooosh! Many an evening was spent running down hills with arms outstretched in the 70s...

 Billy Connelly in a hunting jacket? Suits you sir

Right, I'd best be off - I've got my work cut out convincing Mr Loulabelle that we need matching capes...

Craft adventures #2

So, I've just returned from the second of my crafty Friday sessions. My mosaic flowerpot was waiting for me on the windowsill with all it's little mosaic'ed friends:
I've now completed the grouting (VERY therapeutic - I shall be looking for things to grout in moments of stress from now on) and my mosaic "masterpeice" will be able to come home to roost in the bathroom next week. I think I'm pleased with it - maybe I should have put the ceramic peices closer together so there is less grout on show.
I was surprised at how easy the process was so I might keep an eye out for charity shop china and put this in my mental bank of Christmas present ideas.....

I also managed to make a start on the decoupage - I've decided to go for a design based on circles but the first stage was to create a plain background - this is as far as I got.... Let's hope it gets better (and a little less brown)!!!
Back to mosaic... here are some new and some vintage peices I've spotted on Etsy and Folksy that put my new found "skills" into perspective!

Clockwise (from top left):

1. Mosaic Modern Mirror by memoriesinmosaics
2. Mid Century Mosaic Tile Plate by domestikate
3. Thesarus Mosaic Mirror by Garwerth
4. G.E. Vintage Wall Clock by pinkbeeb0
5. Mosaic Row of Beach Huts by The Mosaic Garden
6. Retro Tile Trivet by Fuzzsicle

New craft adventures

Last week, on a bit of a whim, I signed up to a 10 session taster course of lots of different crafts. It was the creche that swayed me - 2 hours a week of dedicated, guilt-free craft time while Freya plays (or tries to eat) lots of other babies.

The first session was focused on mosaic and after I've finished the grouting Friday, our bathroom shall soon display my debut mosaic flowerpot - the first of a new series of crafted "heirlooms" as Paul rather cheekily put it.

This week we are looking at decoupage and I've been thinking about what I want to acheive. I've decided I would like to have a go at beautifying my make-shift... sorry, "up-cycled" cake tin which is actually a chocolate tin leftover from Christmas. Here's the Before photo, complete with chocolate cake:
I've been searching online for inspiration and have found some really cool vintage cake tins/carriers. Now I want them all!

1. Vintage Art Deco Style Fruit Cake Tin by JollyPollyPickins
2. Take the Cake in Style Vintage Cute Peach and Green Floral Tin Cake Carrier by jenscloset
3. Mid Century Cake Tin by avantgarage
4. Shabby Chic Yellow Plaid and Floral Vintage Cake Tin Pan Carry Box by thodge62
5. Vintage Cake Carrier by claireferrante
6. Cupcake Cake Carrier by theButterDish
7. Cake Carrier by kitchencupboard
8. Vintage Sunflower Cake Carrier by PatinaVintage

I'm hoping it won't look too odd to depart from the usual more Victorian inspired decoupage style and go 70s instead. So, fingers crossed it doesn't turn out as a complete disaster - I have promised myself that I will be honest about my new crafting skills and will post the results, however hideous the outcome!

Dorothy Bohm - more inspiration!

Radio 4's Front Row programme last Friday included a feature on photographer Dorothy Bohm. I love art - and particularly photography - but am more than a touch ignorant about it. Anyway, Dorothy Bohm's life story and the way she spoke about observing the world around her was fascinating. I've just had a chance to look up some of her pictures and I'm hooked! I love the kind of photography that builds a picture of the world by capturing the fleeting, seemingly insignificant moments of life. And of course, being a fan of all things vintage, I love her early pictures - did everyone in the 50s and 60s look this cool going about their daily life?


There's an exhibition of her work at the Manchester Art Gallery at the moment, but hopefully it will be touring later in the year.

Right, I'm now off to sit in windows and stand in doorways until someone takes a picture of me!

A change is as good as a rest

We're now all settled back in after our lovely holiday - 2 weeks of no phone signal or Internet access was pretty special, but it's been good to catch up with the world again and especially great to come back to such nice comments about my knitting needle tutorial! Lovely Larissa from UK Handmade posted about the tutorial on the Made in the UK blog on Thursday so I feel proud that I'm maybe helping to bring a little more order to the lives of some UK knitters!!!

The last fortnight has been such a lovely 2 weeks spent with the people I love the best that I thought I'd go off-topic a bit and very briefly share (okay... gloat) about what we've been up to. I know, this is supposed to be a craft blog, but I've decided that time spent in beautiful places with beautiful people comes under the heading of "inspiration"!

Week 1 saw the return of the Warne family to the North Norfolk coast after a sojourn of at least 10 years. I have really happy childhood memories of the area due to massive chunks of the summers spent at my grandparents caravan in West Runton. We had a hectic week spent with Mum, Dad, my brother, sister -in-law and their 2 little ones. Freya was fascinated by her cousins and it was so lovely to see how much they like spending time together. Watching the big boys really bought Freya along and she had a few firsts: first sitting up, first proper chuckle and the not so developmentally significant first chip!

Our troupe of entertainers/terrors

Being back in Norfolk was wonderful. The beauty and unique-ness of the coast and its villages had become a quiet background note for my vivid memories of hours spent teasing every last bit of white meat out of Cromer crabs, reading ancient copies of Readers' Digest in Grandma's caravan on rainy days, taking sneaky sips of Dad's beer on sunny afternoons in the Village Inn. So it was great to be reminded quite how stunning the area is.

Cromer beach

On the craft front it was pretty productive considering the company of 3 mini-people. I worked on 2 more tops for Freya - finishing a stripey sleeved crew neck and made significance progress on an Angel top (my first foray into crocheting garments).

Week 2 was a completely different, but equally wonderful visit to the Isle of Mull with 6 friends. We stayed in a converted fisherman's cottage in the tiny village of Kintra, on the Ross of Mull with the most perfect view of the beach. The weather was on our side all week and we spent our days making the most of the stunning landscape.

Beautiful Mull

Laura, the writer and soon-to-be triathelete amongst us has a much better account of the week on her blog, but for me the
highlights included:

• walks across beautiful heathland to deserted tropical-looking beaches
• a trip to Iona and the most surreal golf game ever played
• an early morning cycle ride along the Ross
• evenings spent talking hilarious rubbish to wonderful friends with the feel of fresh air in the lungs and the warm glow of exercised limbs

Freya turned 6 months while we were there and again this week was full of firsts: first roll from back to front (and once she started, she couldn't stop!), first time in a high chair, first whole banana, first taste of ice-cream and - here's a good one - first night spent sleeping in a bath (in her moses basket I hasten to add!!).

Craft-wise, there was much activity - you can get a lot done in 11 hours of car journey! I finished Freya's crocheted top, and very proud I am of it too. I also made good in-roads into a simple cardi for a friend's imminent baby - I'd forgotten how tiny clothes for new borns are! Julia (creator of Mr Bunny) was my partner-in-craft and she finished the parts for Bunny #3 and then quickly mastered the art of "increasing" with the sleeves of a boat-neck jumper destined for Freya.

Freya's Crocheted Angel top

Julia's Bunny legs

But the craft-related highlight of the week for me was a visit to Ardalanish Isle of Mull Weavers. The others had embarked on a mountain climb which was a little too serious for taking Freya along. We made a little trip to the Ardalanish farm instead and I was massively inspired by the story of this organic farm who started weaving the undyed wool from their Hebridean sheep almost as a side-line. Freya and I were the only visitors to the farm at that time and had a wonderful half hour running our hands over bolts of the most magnificent tweed and admiring the stunning clothing line they have developed - unfortunately, all out of my price range, but I'm so glad I had the opportunity to visit and admire the ethos of the farm, summarised by this quote from their website:

"For us the production of Hebridean and other Native Breed Tweeds is a step towards revitalising the traditional industry of weaving whose end product pays tribute to the sheep and the energy used to grow their lustrous wool."

I love the philosophy that we should pay tribute to the natural world with the things we craft from it and the people we craft for.